Exploring Children's Literature

Duncan never knew that animal shelter meant all animals were welcome. He thought that, as a monkey, he had to live with his original owner or in a zoo. But, as a well-behaved, young, and healthy monkey, he ended up in a cage at the shelter.

His very first night at the shelter, he figured out how to leave his cage. Of course, it was a trick he wanted to keep secret, so he went back to his cage and locked it up neatly. None of the other animals did anything to share his secret. Gradually, he made friends and invited them to leave their cages at night.

When it became clear that Duncan would be going to a new home the next day, he wanted to share his good fortune with all the animals. So, he broke into the most delicious food he could find. Being a monkey, he knew that the most efficient delivery system involved flinging.

THWAP. The first to get served was Madame FiFi. “Fabulous. I’m sure they don’t have a beautician here,” said Fifi as she lap-lap-lapped the food from her ears as daintily as she could. She took a pawful of the gruel and flung it back at Duncan in thanks.

But Duncan had turned tossing apple chunks to the pot-bellied pigs and didn’t see the gruel coming. SQUIPFT! Landed smack dab on his behind throwing him arms flailing into the corn feed – ACHOO!

Ping, Ping Ping corn feed bounced off the metal cages, all the critters Skittered across the floor to gobble it up. PING PING PING corn rained down on all the cages. The hamster, running on his wheel, accidentally shot some carrots out of his dish. SQUAWK! shouted the parrot, trying to dodge the increasing confusion. He grabbed as many grapes as possible out of the tray and dropped them into the fish tank. The sea horse thought it funny, then, using the air hose, he shot those grapes at the sleeping dogs.

SPLOOOT! One of the grapes went INTO a nostril. aaaAAAAchoooooOOOO the grape shot from the dogs nose ricocheted from the ceiling fat and SHOT straight into the lion’s mouth. The lion grabbed his throat with its paw. It gagged and gagged. Then it ROARED and ROARED.

The lion said, “Who threw that grape?” He clawed up his steak, aimed, and FLUNG it, hitting a donkey in the back. “Hey,” said the lioness,” that was dinner!” The donkey looked around trying to find the monkey. Realizing the only way to get Duncan to trust him was to join in the food flinging, the donkey tossed the steak KADOONK and it landed square at the feet of Pit Masterson, the meanest, snarliest, scariest dude in the shelter. But Pit was a vegetarian, and gagged. So he whizzed the steak towards Tippy the wildcat, who was very grateful for the meat.

At that moment, the shelter truck pulled into the driveway, tires squealing. Duncan raced for his cage and locked the door. The seahorse, who hadn’t heard the truck, launched four more grapes. They hit the keeper squarely in the forehead as she opened the door.

“Hey!” she shouted. “Who threw that grape?”

Then she saw the carnage. Carrots on the ceiling. Hamster pellets in the sink. Lettuce on the floor.

By that time, Duncan was snoring in the corner of his cage with no sign he’d ever left. He was ready for his new home.

“I don’t know what anybody sees in Hamlet. It’s just a bunch of clichés strung together.”

Why do we study Shakespeare? Might as well ask why we learn to talk. Whether people know it or not, they are, in fact, using Shakespeare every day. (I feel the same way about math, but Will is gonna use up all the space here.)

I really do not care who wrote all that stuff. All I care is that someone wrote it all down. And I think most scholars believe it was all written by one person. Of course, there are always some who will dispute even that, but they will probably also argue whether the sun came up this morning. My real point is that none of us exist in a vacuum and you can cause a small ripple or a tidal wave. The trick is not to ignore the tidal wave.

Someone once concluded that the only body of work more quoted, at least in English, than Shakespeare was the Bible. That’s pretty good company. I found thirty phrases generally attributed to Will without much effort. Guess we wouldn’t know what to say without him.

Admittedly, many of these are paraphrased quotes (I blame that on modernization), but these are all phrases heard every day and penned by Will over 400 years ago:

In honor of National Read Aloud Day, I’m participating in Marcie Colleen’s Food Fight Challenge. I start the story, then you continue it by leaving a comment. You MUST throw food and you MUST use onomatopoeia (splat, squish, bonk). Here is the link to other stories: Food Fight.

Duncan Feeds the Animals

Duncan never knew that animal shelter meant all animals were welcome. He thought that, as a monkey, he had to live with his original owner or in a zoo. But, as a well-behaved, young, and healthy monkey, he ended up in a cage at the shelter.

His very first night at the shelter, he figured out how to leave his cage. Of course, it was a trick he wanted to keep secret, so he went back to his cage and locked it up neatly. None of the other animals did anything to share his secret. Gradually, he made friends and invited them to leave their cages at night.

When it became clear that Duncan would be going to a new home the next day, he wanted to share his good fortune with all the animals. So, he broke into the most delicious food he could find. Being a monkey, he knew that the most efficient delivery system involved flinging.